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Love at 10 years old

When I was younger, I fell head over heels in love with someone unexpected. Now, I dont use the term head over heels lightly here. I am talking about magical love, the kind kids have to their stuffed animals and toys. It is one of the most unique situations because as I’ve gotten older, it has completely vanished. I’ve never loved anything as much as I did when it was all in my head. In real life, people do unexpected things that wears you down, a randomness that is so uniquely human that our brains cannot create such things on its own.

One summer I had just moved to New York, there was boxes and clothes everywhere and while the surroundings were unfamiliar, my things let me know I was safe. I went to sleep and had one of the most fantastic dreams ever. I had met and fallen in love with Wednesday Addams. She knew me completely and when she said “I love you”, I not only heard it, but felt it into the core of my being. When she touched and looked at me, it was like someone had filled me with complete warmth and caring.

Then I woke up.

It was so saddening to be back in the real world where none of those feelings or engagement that bordered on a psychic bond. I floated in the cloud of the emotional high the dream had brought me all day long. By the day’s end I was so happy that I almost didnt want to sleep as by the next day I was sure the dream would be long gone. So I went to sleep and she was there. Beautiful Christina Ricci as Wednesday Addams and I spent yet another night together, only building on the previous night’s joy. This went on for two weeks. I was dating a girl from a movie that I didnt really like and whom didnt act at all like the character whom I’d seen her portray. But she was awesome in every way and my young mind spent every day daydreaming of her and our future together.

It was so fast and amazing that I had decided I would ask her to marry me. At 10 years old, I had no idea what that implied in entirety but it seemed that nothing would separate us. I mumbled under my breath constantly that I loved her throughout the day.

I don’t entirely recall now if I was ever able to propose to her or not, but I know that either that night or the next, she was gone. I dreamed of nothing at all for days. Each day without her, the attachment grew more apparent, as did our distance and the idea that I’d never see her again became a depressing reality. I am not sure of how emotionally deep a 10 year old can be, but I’ll be damned if I wasnt the saddest I had ever been up until that week.

Flipping through the channels as our basic cable had just been connected, I finally settled on a channel that was mid-commercial. After just a few moments, the show came back and a beautiful redhead, cute as I’d ever seen, was looking at me. Her name was Willow and the show was called Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Something was special about her. I didnt know what but I watched an entire show I knew nothing about, with several scenes of near softcore action between some not very attractive vampire man and his girlfriend the vampire slayer, just so I could see Willow again.

Now, I was not really a fan of the show, and I wasnt really a fan of her name as I felt it was ripping off a favorite movie of mine about a midget wizard, a baby, and Val Kilmer. So everytime I thought of her name I pictured a midget waving a glowing crooked stick saying “toowatatoowatatoowata”. This quickly passed obviously, but was kind of jarring at first.

I digress, that night when I went to sleep, there was Willow. It was as if I were looking at my old long lost love as she now looked older and hotter than my former love, but had everything else Wednesday had. It was as if Wednesday was back, with a different body and name, but everything else was the same. We picked up where we left off as we had missed each other terribly. Just as with the dreams of Wednesday, every night we met together. This went on for about a week, maybe two. Again, I was on cloud nine, writing little sappy poems, and speaking sweet nothings to my dream wife while I was away in the waking world.

I spent several days trying to find what time and channel Willow would be on, but was having a difficult time seeing her again. At the end of a week or two, I finally had success! There she was in front of me again, just as she was before. Only now there was some quiet girl with long blonde hair with her. By the episode’s end, Willow had made it all but clear to me that she was a lesbian and this new girl was hers.

I was enraged, I was angry, and I was also very, very turned on at the sight and prospect of chicks kissing each other, but I was mostly very mad. I went to bed very upset and hoped I would see Willow again that night. I would demand an explaination, maybe try to show her how much of a powerful connection we had and, if all else failed, maybe attempt to get one of those threesome things I’d heard of. But she never came and I never saw her again, or watched the show again. The two, well really just one, people I ever loved were gone forever and I never saw them again.

In the years that followed I tried everything in my power and research abilities to get ahold of that magical feeling. It was only ever really there when I remembered my dreams, and even then, as the years went on, that too went away slowly. Every time I wrote or felt creative, it felt like I was somehow connected to Willow and Wednesday. It was not nearly as powerful but it felt similar enough to that magical love I knew at 10.

I tried to get into Wicca and got many books in my teenage years in the hope that somehow I could bring that feeling back. I had long since moved away from New york by then and much of the magic of that time in my life was gone. Every “spell” was far too complicated and required much more work than a 13 or 14 year old could possibly do, and many more things one could not obtain at that age.

Then I had a brilliant idea. I needed to go back to New York. There was something about being in that place that might bring back that feeling and emotional connection to the world. I searched book after book for a travel spell. Finally I found it and bought it. There was just one spell in it, and none of the other books contained anything close to travel spells.

And this spell was simple! All it required was paper and pencil. The spell went something like this:
“Write all your favorite things about the location you wish to travel to, and write that locations name on a piece of paper, keeping all the thoughts and feelings of that place in your mind as you write. Fold it into a paper airplane. Close your eyes and speak the name of where you wanted to go and throw the paper airplane. When you open your eyes, you will be in the place you wanted to go.”

I was so excited and followed the instructions to the letter. I thought long and hard about my destination and even tried closing my eyes as I wrote on the paper. Being a rather talented paper airplane maker when I was younger, the making of the plane came quickly and naturally. Now all I had to do was get ready for my trip. I put on a winter jacket and stepped outside where it was slightly icy out, living in Montana at the time. I stood on the porch of my aunt and uncle’s house and closed my eyes, focusing hard on New York. I clenched my fists and threw the paper plane.

I slowly opened my eyes, wondering where I might have ended up exactly in New York and if I’d know my way around. I was still on the porch and the moonlight shone on the paper airplane about a foot in front of me, stuck in an inch of melting snow. I was so mad, I ran over to it and picked it up, focusing angrily again and throwing. It flopped to the ground just in front of my hand, too soggy to fly. “COME ON!!!!” I yelled and threw it again, this time very hard and with my eyes open. Again it barely took flight. My journey to find my long lost home and the love that was there was gone. There was no magic in the world, and nothing would ever feel as good as those dreams did years earlier. I knew in that moment what it felt like to never be able to go home again.